Roderick Mackenzie (January 5, 1868 – April 29, 1957) was a Canadian politician and pioneer merchant. He served in the

Legislative Assembly of British Columbia The Legislative Assembly of British Columbia is the deliberative assembly of the Parliament of British Columbia, in the province of British Columbia, Canada. The Legislative Assembly meets in Victoria. Members are elected from provincial ...

from 1928 to 1933 from the electoral district of Cariboo, as a Conservative. Roderick was a merchant from Williams Lake. Born in

Applecross Applecross ( gd, A' Chomraich) is a peninsula north-west of Kyle of Lochalsh in the council area of Highland, Scotland. The name Applecross is at least 1,300 years old and is ''not'' used locally to refer to the 19th century village (which i ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to th ...

a remote peninsula across from the

Isle of Skye The Isle of Skye, or simply Skye (; gd, An t-Eilean Sgitheanach or ; sco, Isle o Skye), is the largest and northernmost of the major islands in the Inner Hebrides of Scotland. The island's peninsulas radiate from a mountainous hub dominated b ...

which could only be accessed by boat in the winter until the 1950s. He was the son of Murdo and Mary Mackenzie. Roderick served in

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring count ...

as a soldier in the

Boer War The Second Boer War ( af, Tweede Vryheidsoorlog, , 11 October 189931 May 1902), also known as the Boer War, the Anglo–Boer War, or the South African War, was a conflict fought between the British Empire and the two Boer Republics (the Sout ...

in 1899 as part of the Highland Regiment. He later returned there to work as a merchant. He married Elizabeth Maclagan of Perth, whom he met while she acted as the hostess of Lord Middleton's Applecross estate. Her relative was the Factor of the estate. Since he was a bachelor, he asked her to join him to be the hostess there. In Rosebank, South Africa, now part of

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu language, Zulu and xh, eGoli ), colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, or "The City of Gold", is the largest city in South Africa, classified as a Megacity#List of megacities, megacity, and is List of urban areas by p ...

, Roderick and Elizabeth had three children, Iain, Anne and John. Iain died as an infant of dysentery. The family emigrated to Canada in 1908 and Roderick, along with business partner Jim Fraser, started Mackenzie's Ltd. in Squamish in 1912, where their youngest son Alistair was born. In 1918, Mackenzie and Fraser opened another store in Williams Lake at the very beginning of the town's formation. In 1921, a fire burned down most of the businesses on Railway Avenue, but Mackenzie and Fraser rebuilt. In 1924, Fraser left Roderick to run Mackenzie's Ltd. on his own. In his book, The Fraser, Bruce Hutchinson mentioned Roderick as a renowned and visionary salesman and merchant. The Squamish store was later run by Alistair Mackenzie and his wife Pauline. A third store in Wells was opened in the 1930s and was run by eldest son Jack. The Williams Lake store was later run by daughter Anne's husband, Douglas Stevenson. Railway Avenue in Williams Lake became Mackenzie Avenue, named for the store and the family that ran it. The creation of Scout Island Park is a legacy of Roderick Mackenzie's term as an MLA. The Mackenzie family donated land to the city for a golf course. Golf was a passion for Roderick and his daughter Anne. The golf course was later demolished to create the Boitano Mall, and another golf course was created. Roderick and Elizabeth Mackenzie's daughter, Anne Mackenzie Stevenson, was a teacher and school counselor in Williams Lake. She had a junior high school named after her. When the school was incorporated into a new Williams Lake campus for Thompson Rivers University, the library was named for her. In 1982, Anne was given an honorary doctorate from Simon Fraser University for her work in education.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:MacKenzie, Roderick 1868 births 1957 deaths British Columbia Conservative Party MLAs British emigrants to Canada